


Psyche - the story in her words

by nostalgique



Series: I, Psyche [1]
Category: Ancient Greek Religion & Lore
Genre: Action/Adventure, Adventure & Romance, F/F, F/M, Feminist Themes, First Love, Inspired by Eros and Psyche (Ancient Greek Religion & Lore), Love, Modern Setting Retelling of Ancient Greek Religion & Lore, Multi, Philosophy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-06
Updated: 2020-02-06
Packaged: 2021-02-28 03:48:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,696
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22587394
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nostalgique/pseuds/nostalgique
Summary: Before becoming the Goddess of the Soul, Psyche was a human girl, with her own feelings, passions and fears. She is the personification of the human soul - what has her little soul to tell us? Who is she really? What kind of human is she?What if we let this marvelous human being retell her story in her own words?A feminist twist :)
Relationships: Eros/Psyche (Ancient Greek Religion & Lore), Eros/Psyche (Lore Olympus)
Series: I, Psyche [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1625242
Comments: 2
Kudos: 3





	Psyche - the story in her words

# PROLOGUE

There was once a famous human beauty by the name of Psyche.  
In her hair lied the melancholy of bronze shimmer, reminding of the freshly fallen leaves of late August. In the sunlight, her gentle curls shone with the kind of metallic glister that the mighty pharaohs of Egypt dreamed of adorning their bodies with. Her eyes were emeralds, and frightening was their glance, the look of those deep dark green crystals… The whole image of a flawed human soul unraveled itself into the depth of her eyes! ...with a magnitude that could make even the roughest of beings dissolve into tears. And yet, to those pure of heart, the spectacle of her eyes exuded an ethereal feeling, absorbing the whole body and soul. It was the feeling of a drop of water falling into the sea. It was frightening at first, indeed, but turned with time to be so recomforting - because, when you saw her eyes - you knew that there was a divine existence reigning over the Universe, coordinating everything from above. You knew that the Gods had one day willingly decided to bestow such unparalleled beauty on a mere mortal - otherwise it would be an impossibility on Nature’s part to create such sublime perfection. 

I could tell you endlessly of her physical virtues - her silky, white, soft skin. The symmetry of her face, the tender roundness of her arms. Her shoulders, that, just like the softly refined edges of a beach, hadn’t any real beginning or end - they were just impeccably sculpted in the way that not even a Renaissance master could replicate.  
But, that would do nothing but feed into the convention that envious humans have of the creatures touched by the divine. Psyche was aware of her beauty, she was mindful of the power she held over manly instinct and she was at times disheartened by the prisma of hate & envy that other women saw her through. 

She pitied them, though - she pitied them all. 

‘’What do they know of being beautiful? They are so ignorant! - they so often forget how much of a damn curse it is! Yes, indeed, it’s pleasing for one to look perfect, doing absolutely anything, not having to worry about being seen from an unflattering angle or a bad side. But what do they know about the pain of seeing divinity in the mirror, and hating, dreading the face looking back at you? What do they know of the rejection, of the emptiness, the loneliness ?’’ she thought

Despite her beauty, Psyche was a indeed a lonely person. She had a sociable life, invited at every party, meeting all kinds of people, enchanting and/or scandalizing them only by being kind to them, by lacking the arrogance that was expected of her - for most of us have an internalized belief that people blessed with physical beauty must lack in some other much more important department, like intellect, emotional intelligence or humour. 

But it was exactly this quality that took her above the standards of human beauty.

She was not the only beautiful girl in the world, but she was the kind of girl words like radiant are reserved for.  
Yes, she had an ecstatic bodily figure and a grace in her movement that made her look as if walking on thin air - but that was not what made her a divine beauty.  
She was a genuinely kind person, not lacking in intelligence, both emotional and logical. And, if her father had allowed it, Psyche might have been a mathematical genius and a prodigy of the fine arts, for she had a born instinct for the exploration of mathematics & logics. She was born with such longing for novelty and scientific discovery; a longing so intrinsically essential to the human nature. Or, at least, essential for her happiness and clarity of thought.  
As well as a mathematician, dear Psyche was a painter, and a very skillful one at that. She had the ability of replicating what she saw almost to the accuracy of a picture, but almost, indeed. She could copy every detail of nature on her canvas - but to what end? Art is not replicating what you see, art lies in the manner of presenting nature in a whole new way, Psyche believed.Therefore, she always sprinkled her canvas with a nuance of magic & surrealism.

Why was she - such a nice, kind, intelligent person - why was she so tragically lonely?  
It’s because she intimidated everyone around her. The women she met started conversations with her out of pure curiosity, after whispering dirty rumours about her in the corners, and they all walked up to her with the powerful conviction that something must be wrong with her - with the intention of revealing for themselves and all others that this beautiful girl was just that - a beautiful nymph that someday will succumb to age and fade away as gently as a rose dying at the first snow of a late autumn.  
They tested her in every possible way - in their conversations some women would bring up some of the most intellectual subjects that they could think of and expect her to not understand and be able to respond to their remarks. They would tempt her to act disrespectfully, unkindly and even tried to make her angry & mean.

But the more they dived into her thoughts and feelings, the more they tried to break through the surface of her personality - the more they discovered that there was nothing scandalous, immoral or shameful in this girl. Her soul & mind matched the grace of her outer appearance. She was a being that had successfully balanced her outer and inner self. She was kind and did good deeds out of the pure conviction that she would hate to do anything to provoke sadness and suffering in the world - with a pure belief that all people deserved someone there to at least try to prevent their suffering. She understood that everyone’s life is a little tragedy of their own - and if, for only one day you would be allowed to feel what they feel, to have their memories and walk around one day in their life - you would feel how each and everyone of their actions was completely justified. Psyche believed that every person in this world was worth crying for, in one way or another, and sometimes she cried at the thought of people not understanding the tragedy, the pain behind a person’s apparently hateful actions. She would sometimes be angered by humans’ inability to try understanding one another and seeing things from the other’s perspective. She believed with her whole soul in the idea that understanding one another would bring about a golden age of fulfillment to humanity.  
She was sometimes angry at herself for being angered by the hatefulness and envy that people directed at her through words & actions. She would get angry at herself for being shallow and selfish, not understanding the actions of the people around her and seeing herself as the victim, when, really, everyone was a victim of simply being alive. ‘’They are hateful because they are hurting inside.’’ she told herself. She wanted to understand them, to forgive them all, and she did, but some days she just wished the continuous tests and interrogation and envy would just stop.

Even men, visibly aroused at the mere sight of her, were too intimidated and afraid to approach her. They venerated her as the reincarnation of Aphrodite, and, in truth, didn’t see her as much of a human. They could not believe that Psyche would ever fall in love with an ordinary person, someone like them - and it was indeed a bit impossible to fall in love with a man that could not even hold a decent conversation. Some tried to talk to her, sometimes, but the visible nervousness in their voice and continuous fidgeting made her uncomfortable and nervous as to how she could possibly reassure and calm them down. It was a rare thing for a man to approach her, though. And so - our Psyche had never experienced the fiery passion of love, in a society where at 17 most girls were married and were usually having their second child by then.

Of course, the people who broke through the surface of her beauty and got to know her personally discovered extraordinary qualities. They could find no fault in her - except maybe the naiveté of a young girl that she at her 17 years of age was fully entitled to possess. She was at times naive, she tended to live in the past too often and she would be trapped by her passion to build a better world, not being able to properly express herself due to the power of her feelings. These were very human faults, that no one could ever really condemn her for. 

Because indeed, with her divine beauty and faultless personality, Psyche was far from a Goddess. She was a human being, just like you & me, with dreams, passions, thoughts, worries, feelings and an unstoppable curiosity. Given the chance, she would’ve loved nothing more than to build herself a ship and go out on the open oceans, just to see what’s on the other side. 

We humans are tirelessly ambitious - and as youngsters we try to attain perfection in all that we do, until, someday, we stop trying. After suffering, crying and working laboriously in the name of perfection - without an expected result - someone comes by and tells us perfection is a myth. Or that perfect is imperfect. All people who have once been young and ambitious have undoubtedly experienced this, once.  
And that is why people were afraid of her - they saw in her the kind of perfection & completion that they had told themselves was impossible to achieve, and therefore not worth chasing after. They saw that perfection taking form in the human flesh, and ran tirelessly, away, the second they pinched themselves and saw that it was not a dream. Ran away from the suffering, tried denying their human instinct of perfection… all to preserve their current consolation in life, the alleviation of living in a world where perfect is impossible.


End file.
